Think real quick of an Asian city. If you've been to one or seen many pictures, an image of tall buildings, crowded streets and a million scooters may come to mind. A year or so before my assignment in Beijing, I bought a little scooter. 100 miles to the gallon, baby! Although, I really didn't care about fuel economy... I'll be honest, I was mostly concerned about the sex appeal.

Whoops.. back on topic. You'll be scant to find a scooter in Beijing. Its very.. un-Asian, almost.

I've spent a great deal of time in the scooter-intense cities, where there are innumerable amounts of scooters. I've seen a family of 5 riding 1 scooter. Suddenly America's onerous laws seem appealing.

But I was told Beijing outlawed them. I still see the occasional scooter or motorbike, but back home I saw more scooters on the road.

When I first heard this, I was a bit annoyed, because most scooter riding citizens probably can't afford a car, and outlawing scooters forced them  to either ride a bicycle to work, or rely on public transport. I try my best to avoid public transport because every bus that passes looks like a can of sardines. Subways are packed so tight during the morning rush hour, you can sometimes lift your feet off the ground.

I'm not joking.

I was talking about this with a fellow expat friend of mine, and other than the expected argument that scooters are dangerous and too many people are getting hurt, he made an astute observation: innumerable scooters equals Asia equals third world country. Think about it, can you imagine a huge Asian city without the scooters?

I wonder if this was a motive for Beijing lawmakers. If so, I must give them kudos.